


Portions for Puppies

by Tipsy_Kitty



Series: Puppy Verse [12]
Category: Supernatural RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-27
Updated: 2012-12-27
Packaged: 2017-11-22 16:45:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,457
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/611988
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tipsy_Kitty/pseuds/Tipsy_Kitty
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jared is free. Sorta.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Portions for Puppies

**Author's Note:**

> I'm troubled by writing about the Js' actual family members, so I took some liberties. Sorry if it's confusing.
> 
> Originally published to LIvejournal 10/18/12.

 

 

 

 

The group home was too large and had too many stairs, too many people, too many choices. It was too much of everything and all Jared wanted to do was curl up in the corner of Misha's office with his eyes squeezed shut and his head buried in his soft plush piggy.

So he did.

 

 

 

 

Jared had spent another three days in the hospital, and Keith visited him two more times. The second day Jared was mutinous, because after all _Jeff_ was his guardian, and he had not ordered Jared to service Keith, but Keith had a pretty good read on Jared. He had yanked his head up by the roots of his hair and told Jared that there were plenty of other patients who could take care of his needs. Maybe in the pediatrics ward.

So Jared slid to his knees again and did as he was told.

When Keith had escorted Jared to the bathroom after, on legs that didn't want to straighten or support his weight, he had been shocked by his appearance in the bathroom mirror. He was all sharp angles and protruding bones, like when he was 16 and had suddenly shot up four inches. He didn't look anything like he had when he'd been delivered in a cage to Jeff, but Jeff had never grown tired of looking at him naked or playing with his body. Jared wondered whether Jeff preferred him to look underfed or whether it had happened so gradually that Jeff just hadn't noticed.

He avoided mirrors after that.

Dr. Angry (who Jared eventually learned was named Dr. Epstein) had ordered him to be admitted so he could be evaluated for his overall health and mental status. She told Jared that she wanted him to stay at Regional until he'd gained at least 10 pounds, and maybe started talking again. Lindsay had confided to Jared that actually, Dr. Epstein was just stalling until they could find a sympathetic judge to reduce Jared's sentence to time served, even though—with good behavior—he still had almost six months left as Jeff's p.e.t.

When Jeff found out that Jared wasn't going to be released to his custody he threw a holy fit and insisted he would cease payment on the hospital bills he was required to make as a state-appointed p.e.t. owner. The hospital administrators were ready to wash their hands of the whole sordid mess and either send Jared back to Jeff or over to the county lock-up to let the justice system decide what to do.

Before either of those things could happen though, a judge came to Jared's room to talk to him and look over his charges and his sentence. He had a leathery, hard face but kind eyes, and he flinched when Jared responded to his questions with whimpers or barks. He signed the petition, looking at Jared with a mixture of pity and disgust as he did so, and then he swept out of the room and out of Jared's life.

And just like that, Jared was free.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Jared wondered if the hospital was just going to turn him out on the street, but a man named Misha came to visit him shortly after the judge had left, and told Jared that he ran a home for abused people, mostly former p.e.t.s, to help them get back on their feet. He told Jared that he would be able to come and stay with them for awhile, until he felt better, until he felt like living on his own again.

Jared looked at Misha blankly. Abused? Maybe Jeff hadn't always been as gentle as he could be, but he had cared for Jared in his own way. It was Jared's fault that he hadn't felt like eating much in the past few months, not Jeff's. It was Jared's fault he had gotten sick, not Jeff's.

Jared was the one who had fucked countless other defenseless p.e.t.s. At Jeff's order, sure, but he had gotten off every time. He hardly considered himself a victim of abuse, since he had done so much to hurt others himself.

But he didn't, wouldn't, couldn't articulate any of this to Misha. He had a vague recollection of maybe calling Jensen’s name while he was delirious in the emergency room, but he had no command of his voice. It had flown away like a migrating bird many months ago, and he didn't think it would return home to roost in his throat ever again.

Still, it wasn't like he had anyplace else to go. He'd become so panicked when Lindsay suggested calling his parents that he'd begun to hyperventilate, and she could only calm him down by saying he didn't have to see his family until he was ready. Jared knew he would never be ready.

Misha made plans to pick Jared up the next morning after he was discharged and drive him to the group home. His voice was gentle and his eyes were soft, and Jared felt safe in his presence. He did not seem bothered that Jared wouldn't look him in the eye or speak to him.

The next morning Keith wheeled Jared to the hospital entrance where Misha was waiting outside next to an old Chevy van. As Misha stepped forward to help Jared to the car, Keith leaned down and whispered "Too bad you're going, you were a good little cocksucker."

Misha couldn’t have heard him but he gave Keith a sharp look anyway, which Keith returned blandly. "Bye Jared," Keith said, patting Jared's bony shoulder as he turned to go back inside. "Hope to see you soon."

 

 

On the drive across town Misha told Jared how he had inherited his grandmother's house and a sizeable lump of money when she died a few years back. He almost immediately turned it into a home for former p.e.t.s to get back on their feet. He'd seen firsthand how sick the system was when his friend Amy was sentenced to three months as a p.e.t. for a minor drug charge. She had emerged from the experience a shaken wreck, and though she never told Misha exactly what had happened during those months, he had a pretty good idea.

Plenty of ideas, as the years went by and he spent more and more time with former prisoners of the PET system.

Now Amy helped him run the home. Neither of them were counselors or therapists but they found some professionals to donate their services, and Misha and Amy helped the newly freed prisoners find clothes and jobs and get back on their feet. They connected the parolees with the resources they would need to avoid the issues that had landed them in trouble in the first place, to educate themselves, to find gainful employment, to kick their addictions. Some p.e.t.s reacclimated quickly and spent only a couple of weeks in the old green Victorian. Some took a little bit longer, depending on the length of their servitude or the relative cruelty of their owners.

And some, like Jared, showed up unable to walk unassisted, with shriveled fingers that couldn't even hold cutlery anymore.

 

 

 

 

“They’re supposed to take the mitts off every day for at least two hours,” Amy was telling Jared as she handed him a squishy ball and told him to squeeze it, 3 reps of 10 for each hand. “How long did you wear yours?”

He looked at his hands, trying to remember. In the beginning, Jeff had taken them off so Jared could go to the bathroom and bathe without them. Somewhere in the first few months though, he’d installed a bidet next to the toilet that Jared could activate with his puppy paws, and they’d stopped coming off except for baths. Then a few weeks after that, he stopped removing them completely, choosing instead to cover the leather mitts in plastic while he soaped and rinsed Jared's body as he knelt on all fours in the bathtub. By the time Jeff celebrated their anniversary, Jared hadn’t seen his hands in months.

Of course, he didn’t tell Amy any of this because he still wasn’t speaking. And though he was dying for news about Jensen and might have used that as motivation to get over Jeff’s conditioning, another part of him was too scared of what he’d find out. As long as he didn’t know for sure, he could imagine Jensen happy and free and fighting for the cause again, and not befalling some “accident” while in Mark’s care.

 

 

 

 

Jared spent as much time as possible curled up in the corner of Misha's office. He would frequently be kicked out (gently, always gently) if Misha was doing a patient intake or discussing sensitive matters with former p.e.t.s, but he stayed with Misha as much as he could get away with.

One day Jared sat folded in the corner of Misha's office, using his piggy as a pillow, watching Misha rub his temples in distress or maybe sorrow. Jared crept towards Misha and tried to make him feel better the only way he knew how anymore.

"No, Jared," Misha said as he turned Jared's head away from his crotch. "I don't want that from you. I like helping you, and you don't owe me anything."

His words were kind but Jared still felt chastised and confused. He was having trouble remembering how to be a man and his hard-learned lessons in puppyhood were now worthless.

 

 

 

 

Still, as time went by he started to feel stronger. He was able to stand for longer periods of time and use his hands well enough to help prepare dinner for the residents. He still stooped over too much but Amy had set up recurring appointments for Jared with a physical therapist named Anton who was able to work wonders on Jared's atrophied muscles. Anton was burly and intense, and he could often be heard grumbling to himself as he worked with the residents.

"Fucking…idiots…" he would say in his thick Eastern European accent as he stretched out Jared's legs and then pushed them back up to his hips. "Goddamn…slavers…." Jared found the therapy kind of painful but Anton's muttered curses a comfort, and he looked forward to their visits.

One evening Jared was cubing potatoes, working the knife slowly and carefully with his shaky fingers, when Amy brought him news that Jensen had been removed from Mark's custody and remanded to the county jail until his case could be sorted out. Jared dropped the knife with a clatter and gave Amy a giant bear hug, so thankful Jensen was safe that he thought his heart might burst open. Then he dropped his arms and backed away from her, wide-eyed. It was the first contact he had initiated with another person in months.

She laughed and said “It’s okay Jared, I’m happy too. Would you like another one?” and she opened her arms again, but Jared lowered his eyes and shook his head.

It had been nice though, hugging somebody. He hadn’t realized he’d missed that kind of touching.

 

 

 

 

Jared’s family called every day, and every day Misha would raise a questioning eyebrow to Jared, who would frantically shake his head and press back against the wall.

One day Jared heard him saying “He’s just not ready to see anybody yet, Mrs. Pada—”

They talked for several minutes longer and Misha looked very sad when he hung up the phone.

"Jared?" he asked. "Would you like to talk about Julia?"

Jared's view telescoped and pinwheels burst behind his eyes.

"I, well, we know what Mr. Morgan made you do Jared, but you know that has nothing to do with—"

Jared started to shake all over as he remembered how his big sister had stopped leaving her room for weeks when Jared was only 12. He hadn't really understand what was wrong with her at the time, he just knew that he adored her and that something _awful awful_ had happened to her, something only boys could do to girls. And Julia was three years older than him, and he thought she made the world spin around, and when she was sad Jared wanted to die.

And he couldn't face his family ever again, ever _ever_ , because he'd been a _bad bad puppy_ and he was no better than the boys who hurt Julia, the boys who made her go quiet.

He jumped up on shaky legs and fled down down the stairs and into the shady narrow back yard, trying to squish his large bones behind a peach tree so nobody would see him.

Some time later Misha wandered out into the yard and sat down beside Jared, absently scratching at his corduroy pants like he was a member of a jug band playing at a washboard.

"Your family misses you," Misha said after several minutes had elapsed. "They will never not love you, Jared."

Jared clenched his fists, tight as he was able, suddenly sure that Misha was going to send him back to his parents, sure that there were other p.e.t.s. more capable of being fixed who needed his room in the upstairs turret that got warmer and stuffier each day as the summer stretched on.

 

 

 

 

It was a scorching summer evening, and Jared was sitting on the front stoop as the sun sank below the horizon. The temperature held steady in the low '90s, the air thick and humid, and his long-sleeved shirt was sticking to his shoulders, which were finally filling out again. He was trying to get up the courage to push off the uneven cement steps leading up to the old house and walk off into the twilight. He knew there were other p.e.t.s who needed help more than him, other p.e.t.s more deserving of help than him. And still he stayed with Misha and Amy and leached off their kindness and didn't get much better as the days turned into weeks.

He was watching an ant struggle to carry a much larger insect, something winged and twitching, back to its colony when a pair of familiar loafers stepped into his field of vision, long legs casting a shadow over his face. He tensed up for a moment, and then he relaxed.

A leather collar uncoiled from its leash and dropped on the stoop next to him. He looked up, shielding his eyes from the sun, to see Jeff standing over him.

"Ready to come home, pup?"

Jared wasn't, and he was. He slowly climbed to his feet and followed Jeff to the car.


End file.
